Heartbeat
by Lilia5
Summary: This is just a short story from Hermione's POV about when Ron left her and Harry in their search for the horcruxes in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.


"Are you staying, or what?" Ron asked looking simply furious.

"I..." This could not be happening, Ron would never leave, "I... yes, i'm staying Ron. I...We said we would h-help." Hermione half yelled, terrified.

"I get it. You choose him." He said as it were a fact he had known all along.

"What? Ron, no! No! What are you...? Ron come back!" She yelled after him in a strained, strangled voice as he departed, infuriated out of the tent.

Fumbling with her wand, Hermione snatched it off the arm chair and stumbled to disarm her shield charm. Finally, she removed it and tripped her way out of the tent after him.

"RON!" Her voice shook as though someone had shoved a fist full of ice down her throat. "RON!"

In the near distance, Hermione could hear Ron blundering his way though the icy forest. She moved clumsily after him, shaking with something that was not cold. If she could just get to him, just get him to see sense, everything would go back to normal, she thought as branches snagged her at and her hair as she hurried after him.

"Ron! Come back please, please come back please!" She cried, tripping. Hermione was only a couple of meters away from him now, but Ron gave neither recognition of her being there nor her pitiful calls for him to come back.

Hermione sobbed loudly, loud enough that Ron couldn't possibly pretend that he didn't hear her, but he still didn't turn back and he continued blustering his way about the forest with no particular destination in mind.

"Ron, come back! Don't let this come between us," She screamed. Her hands were shaking so wildly now and her eyes were clouded with many thousands of tears that it made it hard for Hermione to hold onto her wand, let alone see where she was going in the cloudless black night.

"Ron," she mumbled feebly, all the energy drained out of her.

There was no stopping him as he marched through the woods with a defiant and distracted demeanor. He was trying so hard to ignore Hermione's pleas for him to return that he paid no attention to where he was walking.

"Ron, I LOVE YOU!" Hermione cried falling over in earnest, a last frail attempt to make him return.

Ron stopped. Did he just hear what he thought he heard? Did Hermione just say that she loved him?

Hermione must have noticed that Ron had stopped and in a rush to get him to stay, her words tumbled out of her.

"Ron, I love you, I do! You can't do this to me! You can't leave! We're all we have! Please, please don't do this! Please!" She sobbed. "I love you; come back," she sobbed into her hands, over and over again as if saying it would somehow bring him back to her.

Ron didn't miss her words that time and he paused for a second to pounder them. Still resolute, he walked slowly over toward Hermione as if approaching an emotional time bomb. He grabbed her chin and tilted her face up towards him. With yearning and dread, he kissed her like he had never kissed anyone before. She grabbed onto the front of his robes and drew him down to her, kissing him back. She never wanted to let go- she couldn't, or he'd leave her forever.

After several blissful moments, Ron broke away and stepped back, Hermione falling at his feet in a crumpled, crying heap.

"Please Ron, please!" Hermione said, broken.

"Goodbye Hermione," And with that, he Disapparated, feet from her.

With a howling cry, Hermione burst into tears and lay, crying heavily on the forest floor for a few more moments before pulling herself up with all her strength, and half dragging herself, half crawling back towards the tent, towards Harry.

Hermione walked back into the tent as if blind, as if she were a ghost, a body empty of a soul. Harry glanced worriedly over at her, wanting to say something, but he was afraid if he even uttered a word she would break. She looked so fragile, standing dumbly at the tents entrance; her clothes torn and bloody exposing cut flesh. Her hair was a mess of twigs and knots and her face was smeared with a mixture of glistening tears and streaky black mud.

"His gone. Disapparated!" She choked out hoarsely, more tears falling onto the canvas floor of the tent. Wrapping her arms around her she walked as if in a trance towards the nearest arm chair and collapsed in a fit of teary jerks and sobs. Tears streamed wetly down her face as she tried to stop the hyperventilating her sobs were bringing on.

Sometime later, it could have been weeks later for any notice that Hermione took, someone wrapped her in rugs and blankets, warming a little of the coldness that Ron had left in his wake. It didn't matter though, she felt like the tears would never stop coming, like the coldness would never stop freezing her and like her heart would never stop breaking.


End file.
